1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a power supply control technique for an image forming apparatus.
2. Description of the Related Art
There is a need to shut down an image forming apparatus during a designated period to perform an electric checkup work in an office building. In this case, to reduce the labor of a management user, a function capable of automatically shutting down the image forming apparatus at date and time scheduled beforehand is required.
However, an image forming apparatus may be used by numerous general users. Therefore, a general user may happen to be operating the image forming apparatus to execute a job at the date and time scheduled by a management user. Thus, it is desired to take a currently executed job into consideration in realizing the shutdown function. For example, if a currently executed job is forcibly cancelled to shut down an image forming apparatus, it will be dissatisfactory for a general user. In such a case, the user may restart up the image forming apparatus.
In this respect, as discussed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2007-320051, there is a technique that includes a remote operation for instructing shutdown of an image forming apparatus and, if a currently executed job is present, performing the shutdown after the currently executed job is completed.
However, depending on the purpose of the shutdown like an electric checkup work, it is important to perform the shutdown at predetermined date and time as planed beforehand. According to the above-described technique discussed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2007-320051, if the currently executed job requires a long time to accomplish, or when there are numerous jobs that are currently queued, actual shutdown execution date and time may greatly deviate from the scheduled date and time.
Further, for the electric checkup work, it is important to maintain the image forming apparatus in a power-OFF state for a designated period. However, according to the above-described technique discussed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2007-320051, the image forming apparatus cannot be maintained in the power-OFF state if it is restarted up by a general user.